How to Give the Gift of US Treasury Savings Bonds

This site and certain third parties would like to set cookies and access and collect data to provide you with personalized content and advertisements.

If you would like this personalized experience, simply click accept. If you would like to opt-out of this data collection, please click "decline" to continue without personalization.

When my wife and I were first combining our finances, my wife had to track down some savings bonds she'd received from her grandfather when she was a child.

Her bonds were still accruing interest, those Series EE bonds earn interest for 30 years, and finding them was a simple matter. Unclaimed savings bonds are one of the most common types of missing money. (Finding your bonds is easy too, just go to Treasury Hunt)

The gifting of US Treasury Savings Bonds have fallen a little bit out of favor in recent years but it's still a great way to teach saving. While there's something symbolic about holding the paper certificate (paper certificates were phased out in 2012), the important message is that of saving.

How to buy savings bond gifts

The process is easy and the Treasury has this interactive video tutorial to help you understand the process. You'll need the sound on to watch it.

If you're more of a reader than a watcher, the process has two parts – buying the bond and delivering it.

Here's how to buy the bond:

Register an account at TreasuryDirect

Collect the gift recipient's Full Legal Name, Taxpayer ID or Social Security Number

(When you give the bonds and want to deliver them electronically, the Recipient's TreasuryDirect Account Number, but you don't need it now)

Log into TreasuryDirect and click BuyDirect in the Menu

Select Series EE

Enter the Recipient's information as the new Registration Information and check the “This is a gift” box.

Select the Recipient's information as the registration, enter the amount, funding source, and set Purchase Frequency.

Review the Purchase Review page to ensure all the information is correct. Smile at your confirmation page.

After you purchase the bond, it'll appear in your account in about a day. You can't deliver it to your recipient for five days, this is to confirm the funds (ACH takes up to 5 days).

If your recipient is a minor, they need to have a Minor linked account that is associated with a parent/guardian.